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Christmas Pics

New images in the "Christmas 2011" set and the photostream.

Happy Winter!

Its Dec 21 and that means..... its the shortest day of the year! Up here in the north country that means that we have 9 hours, 2 minutes and 8 seconds of sunlight! Its the same for tomorrow too, but then we are on the upswing. Come January 1 we will have gained over 4 minutes with 9 hours, 6 minutes and 10 seconds! I won't mention that our sun is not rising until 8:10am now. That is quite a few runs in the dark under the stars. Also, it is our lowest solar noon, with sun only at 23.9 degrees above the horizon. We turn the corner Dec 26 when we hit 24.0 once again. Woot! Ah, the days of summer when we are at 70+ degrees above the horizon! But today its getting up to 40F. I know that January is looking to start off very cold (according to the extended forecast) so i will take these mild winter days with a smile.

Recital

Here's a video of Bee and Frankie's first recital on Saturday at the MSU Community Music School. Lots of family were there and the girls did great! Thanks to Kawai Chan for her excellent job with the girls.

   

Also, feel free to add these MP3 versions to your playlists:

• Jingle Bells (Frankie)
• Happy Song (Frankie and Kawai Chan)
• Waltz (Barbara)
• Good King Wenceslas (Barbara)
• Duet (Barbara and Frankie)

Made to Spokane and beyond!

We made it to Spokane!! 2011 miles for the year 2011!!!!!! I hope you have enjoyed running across the country with us! We need to think up another fun running route for next year!

We hit spokane in the middle of the month and kept on running! We're thinking that Seattle might be possible (2285 miles) but the coast is probably just a bit out of reach (Ocean Shores, what looks to be the closest coastal town is 2387 miles). We've actually gone 2134 miles since January 1, which puts us in Quincy, Washington! This is super exciting because believe it or not, Quincy Washington was name after.... Quincy Illinois (where my sister lives)!!!! Why? I do not know. I cannot seem to figure that one out!

1923 and counting!

We ran another 132 miles in October, which in real life included a lil' 26.2 jaunt around Chicago on a warm sunny day... But the more important news is that we are 5 miles past the Montana - Idaho border! Woot! We have been running in Montana since JULY! Running 6 miles on October 31 did the trick though. Nothing against Montana, but we needed to get out!

We've made it nearly to Wallace, Idaho. We were hoping to find some of those Idaho potatoes on time for Thanksgiving. Instead what we found is the "Silver capital of the world!" And, would you believe it, according to the city's web page the entire town is on the national historic register!

Ok, so we have 1923 miles down and only 88 miles to go!!! I'm thinking we could conceivably be in Spokane by Thanksgiving! We are sure that Cho Cho has already made it to the west coast, as some days she runs with both of us.

Canine Cruise [Updated]

Update: video here.

Angie & Chocho ran the Canine Cruise 5k yesterday on campus, and while it was a little chilly, the girls and I cheered them on.  It was a fun event because the people and dogs dressed in their holloween costumes.  Here's Angie as the Wicked Witch of the West and Chocho as her Winged Monkey.

Posing just before the start of the race. Note Chocho's black monkey tail!

You have to use your imagination for the wings, but Choch's costume comes complete with black monkey tail, and though you can't see it in the photo, angie has green face makeup on.  They not only came in second place overall for person+dog, They also won the award for best costume. Yay!

On the trail at Woldumar.

Later in the day, we went for a walk at Woldumar Nature Center.  The photo above was just too cute not to share.

Update: Angie and Choch made the State News!  See the video here, or click on the image below.

sideways rain

We had sideways rain all day. So I guess I shouldnt have been surprised when got home and saw this. Poor lil tree. Cho had some fun sniffing all around it, but lost a good squirrel viewing spot from the sideroom. Accuweather was calling the storm "Freshwater Fury". Almost as good as a birthday blizzard I guess!

Cho's got a bee on her butt!

Good thing it was a cool michigan morning... the Bee was moving pretty slow!

Walk to school day

The girls walk or ride their bikes to school just about everyday. But, last week was a special "walk to school" day where the students and teachers congregated at the Hannah community center and walked the mile or so to school together. Sparty was hanging out with Bee's class during the warm up exercises!

Almost to Missoula!

Montana is a loooooooooong state! We've been here since sometime in July! And given that we have about 120 more miles of MT we probably will still be here come Nov 1!

September was a fun running month! We kicked it off running 26.2 in Marquette! We logged 191.5 miles for the month putting us at 1791 for the year. Only 220 miles to go to Spokane! Seems within each, but after the Chicago marathon next weekend we both plan a week off of running, then easing back in an easy routine to round out of the year. So, its going to be close! But it actually seems do-able now.

I think the exciting part of this stretch is that we passed over the continental divide! We are in Lolo National Forest, where the bears are plentiful. Maybe that will help us to run faster in Chicago!

Girl

Frankie and her friend Kate made this "girl" out of an old 2x4

Bee and Frankie made their own home made pinatas. It was nothing fancy. They just decorated paper bags then filled it with some candy and dog treats. You can see that Cho Cho appreciated the dog treats! Oh can also see that after many missed attempts, Bee pulled the scarf around her eyes off!

Really?

Unbelievable! This is what i read in the New York Times this morning:

BERLIN — Now added to the list of banned performance-enhancing substances for female distance runners: men. The world governing body for track and field [IAAF] decided in late August that records in women’s road racing will count only if they are set in women’s-only events

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Beech St Bulldogs

The Beech Street Bulldogs fight to the finish. Bee and Frankie easily handed Cho her first loss this weekend in a tough fought victory. Poor Cho. Too many squirrels around to stay focused on the game.

3 Great Lakes, 1 weekend

Over labor day, we had the chance to stick our toes in three Great Lakes in one weekend. Here's the proof...

Lake Superior (Presqe Isle Park, Marquette)

Lake Michigan (Near Manistique)

Lake Huron (Michilimackinac Park, Mackinaw City)

Its Sept 1!

It is Sept 1 and that means alot of things!

*School starts! We will have a big 3rd and 1st grader this year!
*MSU students are back - so watch out for those crazy college kids!
*Football season starts (Go Irish!)!
*The Marquette marathon is here (yah!) and we will also get to dip our feet into Lake Superior, the only Great Lake that we haven't been to as a family!
*And we can post our monthly progress towards our run to Spokane!

August was a fun running month, giving us another 198 miles. This is probably our last high mileage month of the year with the Marquette and Chicago marathons around the corner. We are also at 1599 miles on the year!! 412 to go! We are just 4 miles shy of Bozeman Montana! August just saw lots of miles around east lansing/lansing. The flooding took out the river trail for a while, but beautiful running on the northern tier trail and through the hay fields made up for that! Being morning runners we certainly notice the differences in morning sunrise and temps. We started the month with the sun creeping over the horizon at 6am (sunrise at 6:30), and now it does not creep over till much closer to 7 (with sunrise officially at 7:03). That means some change up in running routes. However the trade off is OK as morning temps are around 52, which is perfect running weather. Got to love September!

Our route took us from Hysham to Bozeman. We passed through Billings, MT along the way. We had to laugh when we saw that the marathon this weekend should give us the mileage to get to through Bozeman and onto Manhattan, MT of all places. Not the Manhattan we are used to, but not a bad place to hang out for a week as we find our legs again. Had to laugh at the town's home page, as they feature "their skyline". We've actually never been in Montana in real life and would like to trek through one day - maybe next summer.

Wedding Dance

Frankie made a very cute cut-out drawing of our wedding,


and this inspired me to make a very silly movie

Lets go fly a kite!

Lets go fly a kite
Up to the highest height
Let's go fly a kite and send it soaring
Up through the atmosphere
Up where the air is clear
Oh, let's go fly a kite!

The girls love to sing this song. haha. Here we are at the park this weekend. It was not too windy, so you had to keep running to keep the kites up, but we sure had fun! The one of Frankie is in the backyard. She got up early yesterday and immediately ran outside in her nightgown to the backyard to fly her kite again! Sorry its blurry - she was moving too fast!

The Eyeball Plant

We were at the children's garden on Saturday and the Eyeball Plants (Acmella oleracea) were in fantastic bloom! They are also known as the "toothache" plant because if you eat the flower, it is a natural analgesic. It also causes the production of excess saliva. Scott thought that they looked delicious, so he ate one. He had a fun time spitting all of that saliva! The flower is supposed to also have some antifungal and antibacterial qualities. Scott said it kind of tingled.

Sack races!

We had such a fun time yesterday having sack races at hannah center field. Im not sure what inspired it, but we grabbed a bunch of pillow cases and headed over on a cool michigan summer evening. No one was at the field, so we had it all to ourselves. We laughed so hard trying to get up after falling. Im only posting pictures of Bee and Frankie!!

lost a tooth!

Frankie lost her first baby tooth! The excitement kept building all week as it got wigglier and wigglier. We tried tying a string to it to attach it to a door knob. Frankie wanted to go through with it, but Bee stopped her as she thought it would hurt too much. Frankie must have eaten 10 applies to get that thing to come out. Funny thing is that it fell out this morning while eating cream of wheat.

Here are a few pictures from this morning and also from earlier in the week when frankie was eating apples trying to get the tooth to come out, and, of course, Bee offering advice on just how to wiggle the tooth!

Fun swimming

We went to the outdoor aquatic center in east lansing. they have a diving pool in the deep end and Bee and Frankie had a ton of fun doing silly jumps off of it!

Play ball!

We went to the Lugnuts baseball game last night. They are the minor league team here in lansing. Bee brought her mitt to try to catch a foul ball. Doesn't she look cute?

FSBO

For sale by owner. East Lansing Schools, that is. Seriously. OK maybe its just a few buildings and not the whole district. But when a district like East Lansing can't make ends meet, you know there is something serious going on with education funding. The cuts to funding might be more stomach-able if they were fair. But, with the debt-ceiling deal struck over the weekend that cuts spending without raising revenues, one has to question how fair it really is.

I read in the New York Times on Thursday that “If a designer shoe goes up from $800 to $860, who notices?” This was a quote in an article about sales of luxury goods that further stated: "Even with the economy in a funk and many Americans pulling back on spending, the rich are again buying designer clothing, luxury cars and about anything that catches their fancy. Many high-end businesses are even able to mark up, rather than discount, items to attract customers who equate quality with price..."

Seriously, who notices? How many pairs of designer shoes does it take to support a child in public school? If the expenditure per pupil in East Lansing schools is $5,749, then 6.7 pairs of shoes.

Pony rides

We went for Pony rides at the zoo last friday! We also saw three American Bald Eagles at the zoo. These were the first we had ever seen in real life. They are at the zoo because they cannot fly due to wing injuries.

Dairy Day!

One of the great things about working at a land grant institution are the animals! We love to go feed the horses and to visit the cows! And, of course, there is nothing like Dairy Day! On Dairy Day you get the chance to milk the cows, pet the calfs, ride the big tractors, and stick your hand inside a cow's stomach. The poor cow - it actually did not seem to mind. It kept on eating its hay. But still i felt kind of bad. Frankie said it "felt grosser than it looked"!