CH CH CH CHANGES

Four runs and one work out this week.  BOOM!   Some weeks you are on it and some weeks you are not and that is A OKAY!  While I didn't get a long run, it's starting to get a bit hot so we are trading out longer runs with short runs for heat acclimation.  

First of all, it was little red's last week of school.  They just had two days and then summer started.  This year has been a tough school year for us and Andrew, but we've seen so much growth and for that, I call it a win!  He has changed so much in so many ways and it's been a mostly fun ride.  I hear that 6th grade is one of the toughest years for kiddos, as they move into middle school here at 6th.  I am looking forward to 7th grade and maybe not as many bumps along the way.   He has had some amazing teachers that have found the good in every situation, and for that I am grateful.  He has also had some angels looking out for him at the school that deserve all the love in the world for loving my kiddo like their own.  

I also fell victim to a Facebook ad that for once, was a good thing.  I kept getting these ads for these fitness Ts and they had buy one get one at a discounted rate, so I bought two and boy are they amazing.  I love ring neck tanks so much for the fact that the girls are big, and I just don't need them spilling out all over the place.  The fabric is very nice with cute sayings, and they constantly run sales.  I like to support small business and try to buy mostly from people I know, but I am amazed at how awesome these tanks are.  They are perfect for lifting and running.  

And once again FB got me LOL.  Our new favorite brewery was having a really awesome looking special, so I convinced Tony to head over on a weeknight for patio beers and steak stir fry.  Tony is going through a lot in his business right now and I am trying to help him in any way I can to destress and see the light at the end of the tunnel.  There is a light, it's super bright, just got to make it through that tunnel.  I know how anxiety feels, how it makes you think the worst is coming and how hard it is to get out from under it.  I was so blessed to have both therapy and great friends help me through, so I am trying to very hard to help him as well.  Please, if you are the praying type, say a little prayer for him.  He has worked so hard on his health and so hard on his business in the last few years that he just needs a little bit of good thrown his way to make it through this.  We are SO close to getting so many big loans that we took out at the beginning of starting Coleman Electric paid off and if we can make it to the end of those, we will have lots of cash freed up to do so many great things.  

We had a very relaxing Memorial Day weekend.   

We started out with Trivia Night at 456 wineries.  Team Low Voltage was ever so close to winning and will be back again next time!

We celebrated Tony's 46th birthday with presents and then a day of whatever he wanted to do.  Yes, that is a Wok.  He wants to do more stir fry now, so he needed a good Wok to accomplish that.  

We got a couple of runs in, even though it was a bit warm.  We took it easy, took lots of breaks, and played in the water from the storms.  

We finally visited the food truck corner on highway 24 and Andrew found his beloved SpongeBob popsicles that his favorite you tuber eats, and Tony found Filipino food that he said was amazing.  

June will be full of events including weights, football camps, and racing so we needed a chill weekend just to hang out and do nothing.  It's nice to have those every once in a while.  Y'all have a great week!

Race weekend and Band, oh my!

 Repeat of last week.  No work outs thanks to band and mom being here and only 2 runs.  Again, my life is very full, and I love it that way.  Running will always be there for me and when I have more time, I will be back.  Here are some snippets from our week!

First up, last band concert.  They played their competition pieces plus their two fun pieces where they got to dance.  SO much fun!  They all sounded so amazing for 6th graders.  Again, I was blown away!

We celebrated with pizza and family time down in Manhattan.  I am so excited that he is going to keep going with band since so many are dropping out.  I get it, there are so many fun things they can do in 7th grade and there have to be choices made.   Andrew is going with art and band and I love that he is exploring his creative side.

We had our first taste of heat this week.  Bleh. I am not ready for this at all.  

Ended the week at Aggieville Brewing on the patio with some of my coworkers.  I am truly blessed to have some awesome coworkers right now and we have great discussions.  You know it's a great work environment when you work all day together and then meet for more time together LOL!  We were just going to have dinner and a drink or two and ended up staying till late just talking.

And we ended the weekend with a great performance at the track from the ginger racer. I don't know who kidnapped my kid and brought a new version, but thanks!  We all knew this kid existed and to see him do what we all knew he could do is SO exciting!  He got two second place finishes to his buddy who races on the national level mostly, which means he is super good and just the right amount of aggressive.  The fact that he held his own and kept right on his bumper and PASSED him several times is amazing.  Andrew of last year would not have done that.  Super-duper proud of him and kind of fun to see him be mad that he lost.  He's never cared about losing, so to see this side of him is new and exciting.  Our next race is in June with three races in June alone, and I can't wait to see what he can do!  We went from praying for him to just stay on the lead lap to praying for him to time his passes right so he can win.  So funny how that happened!

Have a great week y'all!  I am looking forward to my schedule going back to normal, little red only having 2 more days of school before summer break starts, and another weekend of fun!

Happy Mother's day!

This week wasn't the best for working out, but my mom was here and I don't care LOL!  I got one gym work out and three runs and that was good enough.  Here is what happened with our week.  

Andrew had his first and only middle school dance.  While I thought it would be good for him to go, I kind of wish I hadn't have pushed him.  I asked if I could chaperone and he was on board for that.  Since mom was coming to visit, she came with and helped as well.  We were the gate bitches as in we kept kids from leaving and coming back in or kept them from leaving mainly until their parents arrived to pick them up.  It's hard watching your awkward kid try and figure out where he fits in.  There were very distinctive groups and he floated between each, but just stayed on the peripheral of each of them.  He did try and get in with the "sports boys" but they really didn't welcome him in and he just floated on the edges.  There was no dancing with girls, which I totally expected there not to be.  Overall, I think he had a little bit of fun, but I don't think I will be able to get him to go to another one, as he just never settled with any friend group and just looked completely uncomfortable and out of place.  Ah the joys of middle school boys.   

Mom and I worked out asses off for Mother's Day weekend.  We don't have a large yard, but I get so overwhelmed dealing with it.  She knows this so when I told her I wanted to do something with both our side flower bed and both of the front beds, she jumped into action and helped me figure out what to do.  We also worked on the rose bushes, cutting them back and trying to figure out why they keep dying.  We edged the side bed with some rocks from Tony's collection of landscaping stuff he got to keep from a job years and years ago (that lives in my backyard and takes up space and drives me nuts, but that's a different blog).  She helped me cut back some scrub tress that have grown up around our old garage on the back of our property.  We hauled all of that to the dump and went and bought mulch and planted flowers and mulched for two days straight.  I am so glad I have a mom that understands my love language is service and likes to participate in helping me with things that overwhelm me.  It was the perfect day in my mind because the yard and the flowers look so nice and add so much curb appeal to our house.  Now if I can just get the porch finished and looking good and then get our deck back clean, I will be a very happy camper.  

Happy Mother's day to all of the moms out there!  I got the best when God gave me to my mommy!  Now I just need to figure out a way to kidnap her and keep her in Kansas for good.  Have a great week y'all.  

Nader season

 

I am trying hard to be a strong woman.  I love this meme and need to print it out and keep it by my bed and at work.  There is so much crap going on right now that I wish would stop, and I honestly wish I could send this to others.  Sadly, I don't think they want to change.  I think they like the role of victim.  It makes me super sad for them because victim is a horrible place to be, trust me, I know.  Again, I know I have said it several times, but my therapist has helped me break out of the drama triangle and I wish others could find the help I have found because it has made a HUGE difference in my mental health.

Okay on to more fun things or should I say interesting things!   Here are some pictures from our week.  

We had our first really close call with a tornado.  This spun down about 14 miles north of here and took out part of a little Kansas town that is the county seat for Pott county.  My prayers are with those who lost everything, had damage, were injured, or to the family that lost a loved one.  This was a small but might tornado that we watched on the live feed of Reed Timmer as it formed.  It was the craziest thing I have ever seen and I encourage you to watch the videos he got on his Facebook page.    While this tornado was ripping Westy apart, we had sunny skies. A coworker took the above photo from our parking lot.  That is how close it was!  

We also had solo and ensemble festival at the high school for middle schools in the area.  This brought back so many memories of when I was i band, and while Andrew didn't do a solo or an ensemble, his 6th grade band did perform and got graded.  I so loved that they got instant feedback from their judge on what they can work on in the future with both pieces.   I loved both pieces so much that I had to find the sheet music as soon as I got home, so I could play the trumpet part myself. I am so excited he is continuing on with his band journey next year when he starts 7th grade!

We were supposed to have football camp at KSU and then head to Fairbury NE to watch racing.  The races got canceled thanks to the 2 inches of rain we received, and Andrew was just not feeling great post-concert.  We made a family decision to let him hang out and rest and we headed over to our local winery for a sip and shop complete with a taco truck and jazz music.  It ended up being a nice relaxing day with my favorite wine and good food and friends.  

I did get a longish run in this week of 7 miles with two other three mile runs and two work outs.  I am calling this week a win.  

I also ended the week on house cleaning and margs.  I am not usually a marg drinker, but this one was amazing.  Strawberry and lime and deliciousness.  Happy Cinco De Mayo!   

Have a great week y'all!

Riding out the storms

I had this wonderful blog written out about my week, the challenges, and the things I forgot to write about last week.  The blogging program deleted the entire thing and I was so freaking proud of it.  I had tons of pictures and lots of heartfelt words.  Sigh.   I don't feel like writing it all again so here is a shortened version:

3 runs, no work outs thanks to work

lots of storms

and lastly Andrew and his win from last week  

I will elaborate on that because I am so damn proud of him.  Here are the pictures.

We raced our Heavy 160 car with the correct motor.  We got three laps in practice and the shock came off and the car was dragging the track.  Andrew thought it was hilarious.  The class is small, only four cars, but all of the kids are older than him by at least 2 years or more.  In the heat race the first day, he wouldn't pass two of the cars and he got lapped by the leader even though he was clearly faster.  I thought, oh boy, here we go again.  Then the two cars ahead of him wrecked out and he hung with the leader for the rest of the race.  While he had been lapped and actually got last place even though he was ahead of the other two cars, he found his confidence in the feature and passed both cars multiple times.  For that, I am SUPER proud.

Then this happened.  His first checkered flag in a feature.  We were beyond excited for him because we knew he could do it.  He ran super awesome efficient lines and his car drove like a dream.  I think he is going to love the heavy classes because the cars hug the track.  Yes, there was only one other car in the class, but the kiddo is an amazing driver and 2 years older than Andrew.  Once the Marshall racing team gets their car dialed in, he will totally be a challenge to beat, but heck, I am going to enjoy this win for a bit anyway :)

We now have heat winner signs.  How cool is that????

These were the trophies they got for winning.  Super cool and he got spoiler alert, TWO!

First feature win.  He pretty much smiled the rest of the day and the rest of the weekend for that matter!

Funny how they are the same size!

The other two racers had left by the time we did podium pictures, but I am so freaking proud of him for this 2nd place.  

Another heat win and feature win in heavy Honda!  I was sweating on this one because they definitely had Noah's car dialed in more with some expert help from one of our track kids who is a whiz at setting up cars. 

 

Another second place for Andrew in Heavy 160, a class and a motor he has NEVER driven.  We promised him he would love driving 160 (more speed), so much better than driving an animal car (more torque), and boy did he ever.  Once he gets his passing down, I feel like he will catch Noah as their times were so close.  

And another podium for the ginger racer!

Afterwards, he got lots of shout outs from other racing teams, which increased that big ole smile even more.

That is what it is all about.  That is why we continue in this sport.  These kids will battle each other to the checkered flag and then get out of the cars and go play.  These families form a bond that is so special that even when we disagree, it's strong and it's always there.  We ALL knew he could do it.  Yes, it's only one car he beat and two cars in the other class, but it's a start towards using the skills we all know he has.  Every year I ask him, do you want to do this again this year and every year it's a big YES!  Every year he has highs and lows, but mostly lows because we are limited in our knowledge in what we are doing.  Yet he persists.  And for that I will end this blog before it gets deleted again on a big HELL YEAH ginger racer.  HELL YEAH.    

I'm in my Perimenopause era

Thank you Taylor for letting us define our eras.  I'm firmly in my perimenopause era and y'all it is kicking my ass so hard.  Here are a few of my symptoms thus far:

Periods that last for two weeks

no periods at all

extreme fatigue

HUNGRY ALL THE DAMN TIME

30+ lbs of weight gain though I have changed nothing in my diet

hot flashes

low motivation

extreme anxiety

extreme mood swings

no heat tolerance

can't go to sleep

can't stay asleep

night sweats

loosing my already thin hair

pimples

Good things:

My give a shit is mostly broken.  I no longer care what people think.  Don't like what I do or how I do it?  Go ahead, be my guest.  

My anxiety for the most part is allowing me to be a kick ass scientist.

I can use my hot flashes as an excuse to run the lab fan on my full speed and it feels so good.

Let me know your bad and good and how you navigated.  

Thank you body for all that you have done for me.  We will make it through this but geez, let's make this ERA short and sweet!

Listen to your body

Two workouts, two runs and calling it good.  It was a long week full of stress, experiments, long hours, and mean people (see below).  When I woke up on my only day fully off for the week, running a long run was the last thing on my mind.  While I knew the next weekend would also be busy, I just had zero motivation to run.  I know lack of motivation is part of menopause but weekends make me love the long run and there was zero love.  My running partner reminded me that I wasn't training for anything and to listen to my body.  SO I did.  We went to the tulip festival, walked around, and did some day drinking.  I don't regret it one bit.  

I'm going to lay it down here because if I put this anywhere else, I would probably get into trouble.  People suck.  Well, let me clarify, some people suck.  I volunteer and work my ass off for an organization that my son is a part of.  This very organization (specific people) has caused me to have to do therapy again and heck, for that I am thankful but seriously, why are people so nasty that it has to be this way.  Anyway, we had our first race of the season and while we had some set backs, some if which were pretty time consuming, the day ended well with most people happy.  A handful were not and were pretty hateful and for that I say shame on you.  To those who question us respectfully and maturely, thank you.  To those who bitched, moaned, caused trouble, were disrespectful to volunteers SHAME ON YOU.  You had people who volunteer a significant amount of their time to this organization in tears  Over what?  Do you feel better?  Yes, mistakes were made, but we are all human correct?  Let me see how you live a perfect life and then maybe, just maybe I might understand your horrible behavior.  I see this year after year after year and I just want to run to the hills and never come back.  Yet here I am, taking the abuse and saying thank you, may I have more.  Why?  I don't know how people like that sleep at night, knowing that they have been so hateful to others.  Heck, today most of us today in the tower never had lunch, never got a break, nothing.  We worked straight through intermission, so while you had breakfast, lunch, and dinner, sat at your trailer partying and never lifted a finger to help, we were working our asses off.  Do i expect a thanks, NO but I do expect respect and tolerance.  That is the least people who NEVER FREAKING VOLUNTEER EVER can give us.    Okay off of my soap box now. 

Deep breath.  Okay onto race day.  Tony has had zero time to work on the cars.  He has been working 12 plus hour days and he was trying to sneak a little in here and there.  The Honda car just needed some weight added and some small adjustments to account for that extra weight.  The animal car was getting it's engine yanked and a new 160 engine put into so that he could run heavy 160 and heavy Honda.  Tony got the 120 together and they practiced and all was well.  That just left the 160.  Tony decided to pull and all nighter and get it together.  He got zero sleep, got to the track right before the heat races, and realized while it was being teched that ................ it had the wrong engine in it.  Sigh.  Oh well, he tried.  We plan on getting that engine in and practicing before the two day next weekend.   He raced his butt off with his buddy Madden, a kiddo that races on the national circuit.  The fact that he stayed right behind him, ran good lines, and tried to pass several times is a huge step forward.  He ran almost as fast if not faster than his senior honda car last year with more weight.  I'm starting to get a little excited for this season, not going to lie.  

There you have it!  Have a great week y'all:)