Words to live by...

"A good teacher is like a candle - it consumes itself to light the way for others." ~Author Unknown

"A good wife is her husband's biggest fan -- no matter how crazy he is." ~Me


"May God give you.. For every storm a rainbow, for every tear a smile, for every care a promise and a blessing in each trial. For every problem life sends, a faithful friend to share, for every sigh a sweet song and an answer for each prayer." ~ Irish Blessing

Thursday, April 23, 2009

5 seconds of magic



Finally broke the 30 minute mark at Cherry Creek last night.

By 5 seconds.

I'll take it!

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

The perfect date

Step 1)  Bike ride

Step 2) $0.40 wings, cheese sticks, and fries.  Preferably it has to take an hour to get the food...

Step 3)  Watch cat run on baseball field on TV while eating said 40 cent wings

Step 4)  ICE CREAM!!!! (Cheap ice cream no less... "Are you students?" -- "sure, why not")

Step 5)  Rock out to old school Brittany and Backstreet Boys while eating ice cream in the car


The quote of the evening?

Me:  Oh sweety, you're so romantic.
Chris:  It's easy to be romantic when you don't have a job!

I love him.

Today wins "Best Tuesday" award.

Hands down.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Sunshine

Yes, my blogging has suffered lately.

Seriously suffered.

I have a list of excuses though: tired from work, busy with hubby, no easy camera+no pictures=borring blogs... blah blah. But really, in the end, the truth is that I just haven't blogged.

Either way...

An update (I hate writing 'updates', but it's necessary to move past the other fun things that have happened lately)

Springtime in Colorado is one of the most compelling reasons to live here. You can't beat a blizzard/rain storm one day, 70 degrees the next. The day after the "blizzard", Chris and I had an awesome road ride in the springy weather.

Today was even nicer. Unfortunately I had to put in some extra time at work tonight and I essentially missed almost all of the nice weather. Almost. Lucky for me, Chris had the great idea of taking Turbo for a nice walk. Nothing could've made any of us happier.


Chris not only set the single speed record on the AZT, but he also ended up passing his Praxis math test with honors! I'm very proud of him!

We are entering week 3 of the Cherry Creek Time Trials. It came quickly and it has gone quickly. Luckily we have 4 more races after this week. Hopefully I'll race myself into shape! Week 1 was great -- only less than a minute off my PR on the course and over 4 minutes faster than week one last year. Last week was windy, so slightly slower, but overall still a pretty good race.

We've continued to see the babyless-doctor, resulting in only normal tests (luckily). Next step is starting Clomid in the next week or so. We'll see what happens with that!

The Kindergarteners are still a bit crazy, but as the year winds down, I am TRYING to enjoy them as much as possible. While the end of the year brings tedious testing, I actually enjoy doing it. I love seeing how much they have managed to learn through the chaos.

And there's an update.

I really need to get back into the swing of the blogging thing.

This was awkward.

G'night.

Monday, April 13, 2009

The fat lady has sung!

Chris finished!

WOOOOO!

Almost 67 hours? 26 hours of continuous riding (or hike-a-biking) with only a short lunch break? New single speed record?

Niiiiiiiiiiiiiice.

I knew he could do it.

I think we'll both sleep soundly tonight.

I can't wait until he gets home one of these days.

Thursday, April 09, 2009

An ode to my wonderful (aka crazy) husband

Tomorrow, around 9 am, Chris will head out to do the AZT300.

He has officially made it safely down to Arizona -- quite a step up from last year.

As I was driving home from a long day at work and class tonight, I was thinking about what he's about to do, where he's been, and how unbelievably proud of him I am. And when I get proud, I have to do the proverbial shout from the mountain tops in the form of blogging.

So here it goes...

Hubby,

I have a theory.


As with all of my theories, I am absolutely right. No questions asked.

We've often had the discussion about whether your seemingly bottomless pit of talent comes naturally or through hard work. We always come to a conclusion that it's a good combination of both.


Surely you have a natural drive and desire to explore, challenge yourself, and succeed. You approach everything in your life with this obsessive enthusiasm that I absolutely love. A drive like that is not something someone learns, it only can come naturally.


On the other hand, you are the most dedicated person I have ever met. With your natural enthusiasm comes a will to learn, train, and suffer. This is what ultimately sets you apart from any other athlete that I know. I can't even begin to count the times that you have dragged yourself out of a nice, warm bed, only to put on some chilly spandex and head out into the dark to ride. You resist the urge to get into sweats with me when I get home from work and instead hop on the trainer for some hard workouts. I've seen you make yourself suffer because you know that it'll help you out down the road.

You research every possible angle of a race, how you want to approach it, what gear you will need, what mindset you need to be in. You work hard for what you achieve, no one can possibly argue that.


Last year you were set for this race. Your mind was in the right place, your fitness dialed. But, as we've all learned, the unexpected often happens when you least want it to. You rebounded pretty well though, setting your mind to other tasks and trying to stay positive.

So here you are again this year: dialed, ready, fit. But this year you have a little something extra.

And finally, here's where my theory comes in.


You have wings.


You must've been born with them, as you let them peek out when you decided to ride away from your family at the park as a kid and end up miles down the road, only to send them into a frantic search for you (and yes, our kid will be properly outfitted with a SPOT at birth).

I think you let them out a bit here and there, testing the water with various activities, sports, and passions. Even when you got into biking, you tried to let them out but they seemed stuck.


When you finished the Colorado Trail this summer, it seems you found them. You realized that with a bit of frantic waving, they would come out and you could fly.


The good thing about wings though, once they are out and moving, you can use them whenever you want.


When things are hard, when they are easy, or when you are simply turning over the cranks one after the other, they are there in your bottomless pit of natural and learned talent for you to use.

You can fly.

So go do it.

The rest of us will be here cheering you on.

Watch Chris and the other AZT300 racers here.