Sammy's First T-Ball Game

Sammy had his first T-Ball game on Monday. He did well. He had some good solid hits and fielded a few balls. He was one of the few who realized that you don't have to chase the ball if your on the team that is at bat.




Sam and his dad discuss strategy pre-game

Covering first base
Snagging a ball
Bringing it home
Waiting for the hit
Giving it the old college try

Pictures of our house!

We finally took some pictures of our new house. We love this house. The picture cannot do it justice. They also cannot portray what a great location this house is in. We can walk to the grocery store, the library, the church, the elementary school and several different parks. The neighbors are really nice. We feel very blessed and grateful to have found this house.

View from the front. Notice the proximity to the mountains. It is less than a mile to a trailhead for multiple mountain bike/hiking trails.


Front Porch


Walking in the front door you can see the loft, front room, and dining area.


The Loft. We are using this as our TV, kids play area.


Sam's Room is huge, but it does have a sloping ceiling which makes it good for a kids room, but not so good for a room for adults.


Gracie's Room


View from Gracie's Room. This picture does not do it justice.


Upstairs Bathroom


Front Room. Check out the old school wood fireplace.


Dining Area. We love the bay window that looks into the backyard. Originally this area was carpeted for some reason. We changed that immediately upon moving in.


Kitchen


Laundry Room



Master Bedroom


Master Closet


Master Bath

The Garage. We love finally having a garage. No more scraping window in the winter and no more getting bikes stolen.


Backyard (as seen from Gracie's window)



Basement bike riding area and storage areas


Basement play area, parkour area. We are planning to put some monkey bars and a slide in this area.

A return to Tri-ing

Last Saturday I did my first triathlon in years. The last time I did a triathlon was when I was 18 and did an Olympic distance triathlon (1500m swim, 25 mile bike, 10k run) in the Utah Summer Games. In the time since then I have done a few 5k and 10ks, a couple of century bike rides, and gone swimming for fun , but never another triathlon.

Then a few months ago my first college roommate Eric, who I had recently gotten back in touch with via facebook, asked if I would be interested in doing a sprint triathlon (400 yard swim, 10 mile bike, 5k run) in St. George. Eric had also done that same Olympic distance triathlon years ago. At that time we had been fairly evenly matched athletically, but I had no idea how closely matched we would be now and I thought it would be fun to find out. So I decided now would be as good as time as any to try to start to do some triathlons.

So then I engaged in a rigorous triathlon training program. Or maybe not. Actually instead Connie and I decided to move and I spent my time doing remodeling and looking at houses. My weight reached an all time high of 218 and I did little to no formal training. Fortunately, in the two weeks before the triathlon I did manage to ride my bike to work a few times so I did at least get my legs back into the mode of doing some exercise.

Despite my almost complete lack of training, I decided I still wanted to try to do the triathlon. So friday night I drove down to St. George and meet Eric and we scoped out the biking and running courses. It was a nice course with gentle hills and smooth pavement that I was glad to see wouldn't overtax me too much. The swimming was going to be done in a pool where you would wait in line until a lane opened up and then swim 16 lengths of the pool. There were several hundred people doing the triathlon, so some people had to wait hours to start. Fortunately for me, they decided to order the line alphabetically so I only had to wait about 10 minutes.

Saturday morning I woke up and was actually pretty excited to start the race. Because I had very low expectations and wasn't really nervous about doing well, it let me concentrate on just having fun. I actually ended up doing alright considering my level of non preparation. I was breathing pretty hard the whole time and was pretty tired by the end, but I never felt in distress or like I wasn't going to finish. My final time was 1 hour 20 minutes and 30 seconds, which broken into splits was:

Swim(400 yards): 7:55
Transition 1: 3:49
Bike(10 miles): 36:37
Transition 2: 2:17
Run(5k): 29:51
Total: 1:20:30

Eric, who actually did at least some training, beat me soundly and finished in just over 1:06. That is okay though, it gives me motivation. St. George holds another triathlon on the exact same course at Thanksgiving. I think that I will do that one and see how much time I can drop. I think I can drop at least 6-7 minutes off the bike and 5-6 minutes off the run by that time and finish under 1:10. And then maybe next year I will give Eric a run for his money.

Waiting in line to swim

Eric flying on his bike

We sold our old house + a cool picture

We found a buyer for our house less than 24 hours after we put it on the market. Yeah! only one mortgage for us! We wanted to keep our house cleaning while our house was being shown so we went to visit my mom and my sister and her husband who were visiting from Wyoming. My sister took this great picture of me and Sam:

We bought a new house and are moving

More details later

Strong Sam

We were doing some parkour challenges in Sam's room, when he busted out a cartwheel onto his bed and held the handstand position and walked on his hands across his bed. He is amazing!



Then later he jumped a 6 foot gap:


Then he did a L-sit with daddy:

We Will All Miss Sparky

Our faithful cat of 14 years (that's right, I Connie, got her in Junior High) passed away this last week due to incidents of old age.... As a family we decided to hold a little memorial her for her where we drew pictures of our favorite memories of Sparky. Here's a recap:

Kevin- I liked how Sparky would watch me eat my cereal every morning and wait for me to give her the left over milk.

Connie- I like how Sparky would try to lay on my face every night. I hated her laying on my face, but atleast she was consistant. I liked how whenever I sat down she would climb on my lap and wait for me to scratch her ears.

Sam- I'll miss when Sparky would snuggle with me and let me carry her. I liked her soft fur and the sound of her purr.

Grace- I'll miss chasing the kitty all around the house. I'll miss how she wouldn't get too mad when I pulled her tail.