Fire Trucks

To say that this little boy is in a "fire truck phase" might be a bit of an understatement. He eats, breaths, sleeps, and talks about fire trucks all day long.



Today, some friends of ours gave him a new fire truck with a fireman action figure and that just about rocked his world. I know this will be played with for a long time.

The Truffle Shuffle

So over Christmas, my sister-in-law Winsor, thought it would be a good idea to train for a half-marathon together. I thought maybe I could go along with the idea (seeing as I used to be a runner, like 6 or 8 years ago). Well, as it turns out, it would be really expensive for me to fly to Dallas, run the race and then fly home. So while we are training together, it is across 500+ miles and we are running different races- hers in Dallas, mine in St. Louis. I quickly realized that if I am going to come remotely close to accomplishing this goal, I had to enlist the help of my dad since he runs marathons way too often for anyone's health and well-being. So back in January, I started running with my dad. He has been very kind to me- slowed down considerably to stick with me, and shortened a lot of his runs just so he won't leave me feeling too bad about myself. Well, today I made him proud by running the super fun Truffle Shuffle- a 4 mile race put on by Big River Running.


Of course my dad couldn't join me because he is in Birmingham running a half-marathon, but I made sure to call him and tell him all about my pace, my mile splits, my overall time and place, the weather, what clothes I chose to wear, how my sunglasses worked for me, what I had to eat after the race, and all the other really important things runners talk about. And I must say- I did pretty well (for me at least). I ran the fastest I have run in a long time, and felt really good while doing it. I even had enough in me at the end to sprint and beat some people as I was coming across the finish line (it helps when you have your husband and son there to cheer you on)!

So while Winsor is already busy running 10 miles, I will be happy with my four and hope that come April, I will be able to cross the finish line of the St. Louis half with the same gusto that I did today!

Birmingham

oh Birmingham, I thought we would never get to your awesome city limits last Friday. Between the snow in St. Louis, ice storms in Chicago (delaying our plane) and a sick, sick kid, I really thought we would have to stay home. But after a visit to the pediatrician on Thursday and the green light to travel, this little family was not going to let anything stop us from getting to Birmingham to visit James and Steph (and Ginny too)! We all made it in one piece (kudos to the Trippster for flying like a champ even when not feeling remotely close to one) and we had the best time. Steph was at a book club retreat on Friday night, so while we missed her, we had a great time with Nelson's sister Ginny who came over from Covenant to hang out with us too! Tripp was exhausted and went pretty much right to bed, but enjoyed some reading time with his dad and aunt before heading bed.

James cooked us a delicious meal of beef bourguignon and salad and we just hung out for the rest of the night. Ginny had to leave mid-day on Saturday and Steph got back around the same time. Tripp kept himself busy playing and loved Steph's amazing collection of children's books.

We hung out the rest of the day and geared ourselves up for an awesome dinner at Chez Fonfon. Tripp had a great babysitter and we loved being able to go out and have a great time. Sunday was more awesome hanging out- a delicious breakfast, dog walking and then lots of time at the park.

(trust me, I know the snot is disgusting, but the kid is cute and I gave up wiping his nose a long time ago)

We watched the Super Bowl (ok, we fast forwarded through the game and watched the commercials) and ate some great food. Then more hanging out today before heading back to the Lou. We had a great time- Tripp already really misses Molly Dog and Uncle James and Aunt Steph (and so do we)!!!

* most all picture credit goes to Steph